The preparation of a beverage by a capsule containing beverage ingredients is known. In general, the capsule is inserted in a beverage production device, such as a coffee machine, liquid is fed in the capsule, the liquid interacts with the beverage ingredients and a beverage is extracted from the capsule under pressure or by gravity.
The preparation of a beverage by using the centrifugation is known. The principle mainly consists in providing beverage ingredients in a container of the capsule, feeding liquid in the receptacle and rotating the receptacle at elevated speed to ensure interaction of liquid with ingredients while creating a gradient of pressure of liquid in the receptacle; such pressure increasing gradually from the centre towards the periphery of the receptacle. As liquid traverses the ingredients, such as ground coffee, extraction of the food compounds takes place and a liquid extract is obtained that flows out at the periphery of the receptacle.
The term “capsule” refers to any flexible, rigid or semi-rigid packaging container containing beverage ingredients. Other synonyms to a capsule are: “pod”, “pad”, “cartridge” or “sachet”. The capsule can be designed for a single use. The container can also be filled with ingredients by the user to form the capsule just before use.
The term “ingredients” means any suitable beverage substance such as ground coffee, soluble coffee, leaf tea, soluble tea, herbal tea, dairy powder, culinary powder, baby food, other beverage nutritional ingredients and any combinations thereof.
A capsule system and method for preparing a beverage from a capsule using centrifugation forces is described in the following documents: EP2210539, WO2008/148604, WO2008148650, WO2008/148646, WO2008/148656 and WO2010/026045.
It is known to use a capsule in a beverage brewing device using centrifugation wherein a closing wall of the capsule is removed or perforated for enabling insertion of beverage extracting means.
In WO 2008/148834, a capsule is proposed with a lid comprising a series of outlets at its periphery; the capsule being closed by a membrane. The membrane can be pierced, cut or removed by the user for uncovering the outlets before the capsule is inserted in the centrifugal brewing device. In particular, the device comprises perforating (extraction) element for perforating peripheral outlets in the membrane thereby enabling beverage release out of the capsule. The lid comprises an annular recess to ensure that only the membrane is perforated by the perforating (extraction) elements of the device but the lid is not damaged, in particular, no undesired opening is provided in the lid. A disadvantage is that this capsule requires the assembling of many elements and is relatively expensive to produce. Another disadvantage is that the internal volume of the capsule is reduced by virtue of the recessed portion of the lid which is required to prevent the perforation of the lid in the device by the perforating (extraction) elements.
Other documents of background are WO 2010/066705A1 and WO 2010/063644 which relate to a capsule for the preparation of a beverage in a centrifugal brewing device by feeding liquid in the capsule and rotating the capsule along a rotational axis in the device to produce centrifugal forces on the liquid and forcing a beverage out of the capsule, wherein the capsule comprises containment walls containing beverage ingredients; said containment walls comprising a bottom wall, a widening sidewall and a top wall.
There is a need for providing an alternative capsule which is adapted to deliver a beverage by the method of centrifugation but which is simpler and less expensive to produce than the capsule of the prior art and which also optimizes the volume available for the beverage ingredients.